Chromebook and Chrometop owners may get a free 100GB Google Drive upgrade

When Google finally launched Google Drive, it seemed like the perfect companion for Chromebooks and Chrometops. And now it looks like Google may be getting ready to hand over 100GB of free Drive space to Chrome OS hardware buyers.

Comments spotted in the Chromium OS source code revealed the promotion, posted under the title “alternative GDrive promotion for the File Manager.” Drive support was added to the Chrome OS stable channel last month, and perhaps Google has decided that it’s time for a push. The company hasn’t confirmed the offer yet, saying only that they’re always looking at ways to “enhance the user experience.”

100GB of free cloud storage would certainly enhance the Chrome OS experience. Chromebooks and Chrometops don’t offer much in the way of internal storage — that’s by design, of course, because they’re running what amounts to a bootable web browser. That extra cloud space comes in handy when your device is always connected but only has 8 or 16GB of internal storage.

There may be a catch, however. Based on a deeper look at the code, the Google Drive upgrade may only be offered with a new Chromebook or Chrometop purchase, with the offer appearing as part of the out-of-the-box experience. If you’ve already purchased a Chrome OS device, you may not be entitled to the upgrade. A 100GB is quite reasonably priced at $5 per month, but it would be nice to see early adopters rewarded, too.

Until the code gets pushed to one of the official Chrome OS builds and Google flips the switch, there’s no way to be certain what its plans are. If you log in to your device one morning and find yourself staring at a promo offering the Google Drive upgrade, you’ll know you’re eligible!

Speak Your Mind

Rick Flynn

As an original cr-48 user too, it’d be nice to see the 100GB Google Drive as well. Not sure that would be much incentive for me to replace it with a new Chromebook though. I will disagree respectfully with the previous commenter that Chromebook isn’t usable for many. Just not everyone at the current state of the art. Perhaps when reliable 4G is commonplace might that change……